control of the country and wrested power away from the muslim brotherhood and its president mohamed morsi. protesters immediately set off fireworks after the head of the military announced the suspension of the constitution and named the chief justice of the country's supreme court as the interim president. this comes after morsi led a 48-hour ultimatum imposed by the military expire vying not to step down. soon afterwards an aide posted a messagetom facebook that read in part for the sake of egypt and for historical accuracy, let's call what is happening by its real name, a military coup. and going for the latest on what's happening, live to tahrir square and nbc's ayman moi ha dean. good day. or actually good night. >> good night to you, as well. it's certainly a good night for the people of egypt, at least those in the tahrir square ever

since the announcement was made that the military had ousted former president mohamed morsi and handed over the country to an interim administrative government. this has been the scene of jubilation and joy. since that announcement was made, the sentiment of the people is their revolution has been saved. they are now for the first time able to perhaps get their country back on the right track. the track they wanted back in 2011 when they ousted the former dictator hosni mubarak. however, tonight it is a very different tone from the supporters of president mohamed morsi including himself. we were able to hear from him, a posting was made on the official facebook page in which the president or the former president rather said that this was a military coup. he called on all citizens as well as members of the armed forces to reject this coup and more importantly, to aside by the law and constitution. even despite the fact that he

has been ousted by military, he is still extremely defiant. now, at this stage, members of the muslim brotherhood and freedom and justice party, most of their leadership is at a protest across town. we understand it is a very different scene than the one here. one of great somber, one of great sorrow. they feel a democratically elected president has been taken away from the will of the people so to speak. it is a very different scene in that part of the city than what we're seeing here tonight. many people are prayed that division is going to play out in the next coming -- in the next couple of days. to try and alleviate that tension, the announcement that was made by the commander of the armed forces, he was flanked by senior members of egyptian society, notable figures including religious once, notable politicians like muhammad al baradei die and more importantly representatives of the youth organizations that have been the driving force behind escript's revolution, the

first and second one. it is a tone that the military is trying to strike early that they don't want to be part of a political fray and more importantly they are charting an clear course early on about what they want the country to do in the coming months and in the transitional interim period. >> and ayman, i want to drill in on what you said about morsi. physically, do we know where he is? number one. and number two, is there security deployed to that other location you talked about where you do have sort of the supporters of the morsi government sort of somber and gaggered together? but is there security there and is there any fear of reprisals against the muslim brotherhood or the forces loyal to morsi? >> reporter: certainly the muslim brotherhood feels and their supporters and it's important top emphasize the brother hood has millions of supporters, a very popular base. they feel they are the target of this coup. they feel there are going to be reprisals against them.

one important measure we have already seen within the last half hour is ha religious channels, those that are affiliated with the muslim brotherhood and other ultraconservative islamic political movements have been taken off the air already. we understand that was a result of a decision by the minister of interior. perhaps he was afraid that they were going to attempt to try and create some type of incitement. we do understand these are very popular media channels out here that reach millions of homes. they have already been taken off the air. the military has been deployed around that protest that is belonging to the supporters of president mohamed morsi. despite that, we are getting initial reports of some of the rising tensions in that area. some of the protesters that were opposing president morsi have moved in the direction of the supporters of president porscy and it is precisely that type of confrontation or that type of friction the military wants to try to avoid. the military is deployed in that

area. back to your original quell about morsi, is he as we understand it, at least, at one of several presidential palaces that is under the guard of the republican guard. the republican guard. there are several presidential palaces official buildings belonging to the presidency. it's not yet clear which one he is at, but we understand he is till under the protection of the republican guard which is a branch of the military tasked with securing the president i. now, clearly, he no longer pungss as the president. it's not yet clear in what capacity he is still being protected at this stage. but without a doubt in the coming hours, we'll learn more from the military and certainly from president morsi himself, former president porscy now and from the muslim brotherhood. >> lastly, tell us a little bit about the interim president. is he well-known to the egyptian people? >> he is certainly an individual that is respected. in fact, he's got a very high profile individual. he comes from the supreme constitutional court, the

supreme constitutional court was one of the main judiciary bodies in this country for years was very well respected. under the previous regime, it had a lot of its power stripped away because it was seen as an institution that stood up to the former government. in this case, the president of the supreme constitutional court is a very low profile individual. that may work well for the country in this period. keep in mind, he will have according to the military the power to legislate by decree. people here are hoping he will not do so unilaterally. that is the test to see what kind of tone he strikes early in his interim period but he is an individual that is widely respected. he is a judicial scholar. he's an individual that is considered to be very respectful of minorities, of different political organizations. and above all, is he a lawyer by trade, a judge by trade. so people hope that he will not be a political figure.

he will create a of technocrates to try and get egypt back up on its feet, tie to get egypt back on the right path in its transition to democracy but more importantly to try to get day to day governs right on the right track. it is going to be extremely important to see what kind of government he creates in the early days of had his administration although it is an interim one, it is a very important one. >> let's quickly bring in michael o'hanlon at the brookings institution, and former ambassador to morocco mark ginsburg. michael, back in 2011 when we saw the first arab spring and the protests in egypt that ousted mubarak, there was a chant on the street the army and the people are one. now the army is being put forward as the guarantors of emerging democracy in this country. does it strike you you still have so much power in the military essentially to create regime change? >> well, you know, it's a great question although the army now says it's acting on behalf of

the people. let's bear in mind these demonstrations in egypt in the last few days have frankly not only been big but among the biggest in history. i think in human history. if i'm getting accurate tallies on the number of people involved. so in a sense what you've got is a popular impeachment of president morsi almost or at least the military can tell itself that story. i'm not necessarily thrilled with these developments because i think morsi was in a very hard place and while he made a lot of mistakes. >> i'm not sure this extra constitutional step is ideal for egypt. leave that as it may be, i think the army felt it was not only defending secular tradition and trying to keep egypt stable at some level but that it was responding to a popular referendum in the streets of egypt which was on a scale ha spoke for itself and really demanded some kind i have response. >> and mark ginsburg, elaborate on that a little bit. we haven't official word out of the white house out of washington, but this is an awkward situation.

you had a democratically elected president now being deposed again essentially by the military. morsi is still calling it a coup. how should the white house respond and how could you expect them to respond? >> i very much like what my friend michael han lon just said that, this is a popular impeachment. i think it captures exactly what is taking place here. the white house has tried to convince mr. morsi over the last few days lieu any number of calls from the secretary of state, the president, secretary of defense to his counterpart general assisi the head of the extreme forces that essentially led this military effort against the morsi regime to try to develop some sort of consensus. as a man just reported from cairo, president morsi was absolutely defiant in a speech that was as defiant as it could get against this outporing of anger and anmossity against his regime. the administration, the obama administration has had an extraordinarily difficult time navigating the changes that have

taken place within egyptian society. those people have taken to the streets blame washington more or less for sadding up to preds morsi. at the same time, there's no doubt that no one in this administration was particularly comfortable with the anti-democratic autocratic nature of his regime. and so the fact is what i think the administration will want to see is a transition to a technocratic government that will do exactly what michael said is necessary. to bring this country back off on to its knees. you have to realize, there's no security in the streets. the food lines are so long, that people can't even get food. the fuel lines are so short that people -- so long that people have shortages of fuel. the country has reached a point where in its major cities there's virtual anarchy at this point and that's why the military had to act. >> you know, i want to bring ayman back in on that question. really of how much the economic situation in the country had to

do with this popular rebellion against the morsi government versus the idea of it being islamism, being the muslim brotherhood's sort of religious impositions. which of those things weighed more on the people in the street? >> well, you know, in fact, a lot of people sanding here voted for morsi and certainly voted for the muslim brotherhood's freedom and justice party in elections. the best way it is being described really is that it's been a two-tier problem that has gotten worse and worse day by day. you look at the big picture issues of this country since 2011, that is a genuine reform to a real democracy. that hasn't happened in the eyes of the people behind me. and what i mean by that, is the constitution that was passed was one that was very conservative, did not protect minority rights, women's rights. it had a lot of flaws in it. many felt it was favoring religious parties over secular ones. a lot of institutional problems. there was no reform from the

security services 0 are within the security services. the laws on people's daily lives felt more and more constraining we when it came to issues of freedom of the media and the press. there was a tremendous amount of structural problems with the society. in addition to that as we just heard from the ambassador, it's also day to day issues. prices were soaring. the economy was crumbling. egypt's foreign reserves were depleting quickly. there was the problems of inflation, crime, fuel lines, that made life intolerable for oertd egyptians. so the fusion of those twos issues, the fact that the muslim brotherhood did not address either one of those on a microor macro level compounded the problems that brought out millions to the streets on sunday. some have suggested if the muslim brotherhood or the president had struck a more positive tone in the way it was conducting state fairs and it would have reached across the political divide, this he could have possibly avert this had

moment. beam have given them more time to try and implement the kind of reform to go the egypt's economy back on track. nobody here is fooled to think these problems can be solve solved overnight but they felt that the direction of the administration was misguided that it was not focused on the priority of the day to day lives of the people and it was not doing enough on the larger democratic refors to bring egypt to a modern democracy, and those two issues is what brought egypt to this critical juncture in modern history. >> michael o'hanlon, the irony of morsi essentially sort of bunkered down and refusing to step down, how incredible, it is almost as if the plo tests in 2011 were simply extended to this year, extended to today with him digging in and the people saying noing >> well, you know, it's uncanny. it's gist so ironic because of course, as a man just said and mark ginsburg knows very well, this president and his party have been very effective in one

sense politically. in winning votes. in the key elections of the last couple years. while they do have hard right challenges from the much more conservative movements and challenges from the sec cuellarists this he won by any account by mib's reckoning some solid electoral victories a very short time ago. yet, now morsi sees it seems most of his country turned against him. so it's got to be just an incredible roller coaster of emotions and really some cognitive dissidence. he probably can't believe it. on the other hand, he looks out at the street and sees incredible numbers of people turned against him. i think as mark ginsburg correctly pointed out, a real turning point was that terrible speech by the president. he sort of took away the case for those who wanted to be patient with him, stand by him. top give him more time because he showed that he wasn't handling the crisis well. if he wasn't handle willing the

crisis well, it was hard to see how he col maneuver his way out of it. >> stay which is as we continue to monitor the situation unfolding in egypt and, of course, we're keeping a close eye on the george zimmerman trial. we'll be back in a moment. ready?

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and we're back and covering the extraordinary developments in escript where the government of mohamed morsi has apparently been ousted. the military having taken over. we're still talking with michael o'hanlon, senior fellow the at brookings institution, former ambassador mark ginsburg. mark, i want to ask you about the u.s.' leverage here. the u.s. sends $176 billion worth of aid every year to egypt. how much influence does that buy? it doesn't seem we've had a great deal ef leverage over the morsi government.

>> actually, it has brought very little leverage with respect to the morsi government or much less to the military. the fact is is that there are very good contacts, continuing contacts on a military to military level. the head of the supreme forces of egypt, general alcee see is obviously well-known to all the pentagon establishment. mr. morsi has had actually some relatively good what i would call personal ties with president obama but the fact is is that clearly, morsi rebuffed the president's appeal pore consensus as a result of the defiant speech that we see that didn't really have much influence. the fact is, is that from a strategic perspective, the united states has a great attack in the stability of the egyptian military first and foremost because of its role in guaranteeing the camp david accord agreements between israel and egypt and secondly to maintain a stability. there's been a lot of violence,

skroi, in the streets of egyptian cities leading up to tonight. we have to remember that while we're seeing all of these joyful demonstrations in tahrir square, there's a lot of violence that is taking place if other cities across egypt by opponents and supporters of president morsi. >> stay with me for a moment. i want to bring in peter alexander, nbc's white house correspondent who is outside the white house. peter, we haven't yet heard from the obama administration. do we expect a statement today? >> it's a good question. we've reaped out to them as you can imagine multiple times. so far have obviously not heard from them yet. the president is in the west wing at this point. we don't have any information to share about meetings with advisors or whether or not any formal statement will be made, either a paper statement or a statement before the cameras. i want to share new information, if i can though very quickly. this is coming to us from our chief pentagon correspondent jim miklaszewski who is reporting that u.s. officials now tell nbc

news that prior to i guess now former president morsi's ouster, egyptian military officials had assured the u.s. that the military would not assume long-term control of the government. i'm reading this information in an e-mail sent by mick to make sure we get it righten an ensure the safety and security of the u.s. embassy personnel and all americans in egypt. it's also been reported that egyptian military leaders assured the u.s. they would put civilians in charge of the government as quickly as possible. the egyptian military announced today that the chief of escript's constitutional court would be as the temporary head of the government. mick goes on to report there have been conversations taking place over the course of this week between the secretary of defense in this corrupt, chuck hagel and his counter part in egypt as well as the chairman of the joint chiefs can of staff, general martin dempsey and his unite counter part in egypt, as well. the u.s. has closer ties frankly

to members of the military in egypt really than they do with the members of the civilian government. the now former civilian government in that country. in terms of the conversations between now former president morsi and president obama, the last time that we know they spoke was just a couple of days ago while the president was still traveling in africa. it was a phone conversation they had. the president was asked specifically about his thoughts as this is uprising continued in that country. he said that he during the course of the call we were told by advisors pushed morsi to exercise restraint to allow peaceful protests and he expressed concern over the violence taking place in that country, as well, specifically calling for efforts to make sure there are no sexual assaults really focusing on the women who are being a part of these peaceful protests, as well. >> great information from peter alexander. jim miklaszewski. michael o'hanlon, can you respond to the information we just got from the peter regarding the assurances that the military in egypt has given

regarding protection of the u.s. embassy, civilian cell returning and also the protection of women in the country? how confident are you in those kinds of assurances? how confidence could the u.s. be, given our as peter said, our long 0 standing contact with egypt's military? >> i'm of two minds about it because on the one hand, egypt is a place where americans have continued to travel until very recently although, of course, one was killed a couple of days ago there. it's been a society that's retained some degree of restraint in the discipline of these crowds and the amount of violence that occurred. the original revolution of two years ago was relatively modest in the violence levels that ensued. orthopedic, the sheer magnitude of what's going on with these crowds has to make you nervous and the uncertainty about what morsi supporters will do now that you've been getting in the interviews of the last half hour has to leave you somewhat unsure, as well. so i think it's reasonably

promising. i've got to respect egyptians in general and their ability 0 keep a lot of the turmoil of the last two and a half years within certain bounds, but it is a very, very it your bu leapt time to say the least and so we'll have to see what happens. >> and mark ginsburg, as a former ambassador, can you quickly put yourself in minds of the people in the american embassy there? in cairo? sort of what is the protocol? what would happen in a situation like this? what would be the things that would be done? is it a situation where we could see our embassy evacuated? >> he will with, is the embassy and the residence are smack in the middle of cairo. one of the largest embassies in the world with officials from all over every branch of the u.s. government. it is guarded by a con teng gent of marines internalally and probably externally by military deployments of the egyptian armed forces. so the first and foremost role of any ambassador is to ensure

the protection not only of their employees but also to send out a signal to all of the american who are traveling in egypt and hon have registered with the embassy where to go, what to do, how to avoid being in effect injured as a result of what is taking place. stay in your home. do not open the door. do not say anything that would further antagonize anyone. so in effect, and this may result in the pentagon considering some sort of potential evacuation of unnecessary dependents and so i'm sure that secretary rice -- i'm sorry, the national security visor rice now as well as secretary kerry are doing all they can and first and foremost to insure the immediate protection of american iz cs in egypt. >> thank tapping michael o'hanlon for being with us. everyone else stay there. we're going to continue following breaking developments out of egypt and we will be right back. ♪ this summer was definitely worth the wait.

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we're continuing to follow developments in egypt. joel ruben comes to us by phone. and joel, you worked the egypt deck while you were at the state department during the george bush administration. can you react to the developments we've seen today? >> joy, thanks for having me. this is really remarkable. it's almost like we're watching egypt hit the reset button from two and a half years ago where the generals come out, promise to install a democratic government one that is inclusive that enables egyptian society to move forward to improve its economy, to have diverse voices at the table. and so we'll see what happens. clearly the egyptian people over the past year in particular have grown impatient with mohamed morsi and the muslim brotherhood's leadership and prior to that with the military, as well. they have a reason to be impatient and a reason to be in the streets protesting.

this day not necessarily mean we'll have smooth sailing in the days ahead >> he joel, could you give us a sense of how pivotal a stable egypt is to both u.s. interests in the region and to the region itself? >> there are multiple ways in which a stable egypt can benefit the united states and the middle east in multiple ways where an unstable egypt can have a negative impact across this region. there's several hundred million people in the arab world in north africa and the middle east. egypt sits at the pinnacle at the center. cairo is the leading city in the arab world. it really sets the own for much of arab life and arab culture. politically, the arab league has been headquartered there and egypt's governments have always had a dominant influence over the politics of the region. then there's the strategic issues. egypt and israel have a peace treaty now and have had one for several decades that the united

states has underwritten after decades of war. egypt is sitting next to a volatile libya today where there's a country in flux and chaos and has many weapons flowing out of it. and then as mark mentioned, as well, economic flows through the suez canal continually go through through shipping lanes and it's a real potential choke point for commerce, but it's not a choke point currently but it is a major thoroughfare. so egypt sits at the nexus of these political, strategic and economic interests. we need it make sure that they will are providing as much stability as they can in the days ahead so that the international community has confidence in egypt's management. >> hang in, joel ruben. i want to go back to nbc's peter alexander with an update for us from the white house. >> we don't want to take a lot of your time. we continue to keep our audience up to date. within the last five minutes, we saw the arrival of secretary of

state chuck hagel entering the west wing, presumably for a meeting of some sort to take place with the president here. we did not see the marine guards outside the west wing most of the day. the president had he no scheduled events today, having just returned from his week-long trip in africa and then within about the last hour or so, we saw the guard come outside the door which is an indication the president is now working within the west wing. as we just reported to you, we know that chuck haig is one of those individuals gathered will for what we presume to be some form of a meeting to take place. >> thank you so much, peter. a very important time because we're dealing with syria, a lot of issues in that region. thank you for that update. i want to quickly go back to park ginsburg and talk about the regional issue. you still have bashar al assad still in syria. this comes right at that time where we're he clearly dealing with iran. if egypt can get itself together and make this transition peacefully, could this provide

us even better leverage if we have a stronger more democratically supported government in the area? >> i think every one of us would love to see a strong democratic institutionally well established government run in egypt. the fact of the matter is, joy, is that fortunately for egypt, it doesn't face the same type of sunni secular divide that is tearing apart the fabric of societies in syria as well as in iraq as well as in bahrain. what we're seeing here is really more a multitiered disapproval of the government that has an islamist versus secular aspect to it. an economically deprived versus an economically mismanaged government aspect to it. so what is driving egypt is will esto do, believe it or the no, with strong sectarian religious islamist fault lines and much more to do with enormous

dissatisfaction with the islamist government that is trying to in effect impose its edicts of islamist civil society on a population that, frankly, is very islamic in its traditions did you doesn't want to embrace this islamist agenda that mr. morsi was shoving down their collective throats. remember also, joy, he was elected with 51% of the vote. so the fact is is that 49% of the egyptian people did not want to see the muslim brotherhood elected in the first place. >> now clearly the country is changing were whether morsi wants it to or not. we're about also monitoring the george zimmerman trial. . we'll bring you gyp daupdates. these are good. told ya! i'm feeling better already. [ male announcer ] new alka seltzer fruits chews.

we'll bring you updates. i'm feeling better already. could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. yep, everybody knows that. well, did you know some owls aren't that wise? don't forget i'm having brunch with meghan tomorrow. who? meghan, my coworker. who? seriously? you've met her like three times. who? (sighs) geico. fifteen minutes could save you...well, you know. and we are back monitoring developments in egypt where the military has essentially ousted the president mohamed morsi and installed an interim government. i want to bring in professor james peterson, an msnbc

contributor and a contributor to the grio.com and james, want to ask you about this concept of democracy. we do have this sense in the united states that it is simply about elections, about the will of the people. but in egypt, we have an emergent democracy where the will of the people is essentially being expressed through the military. do we need to start to create a more fluid concept of what it means to be a democratic country? obviously, i think morsi won in the democratic election with i think 51% of the vote. so it was already going to be a contested situation. i think as outsiders here in the states we also have to understand that we think should be the outcomes of the arab spring may or may not be that. and that the unfolding of democracy is a messy messy process. and so i'm reading the tea leaves here and seeing there are lots of people who are real

excited what's going on in egypt right now, mostly because it's centrist folk within the country rejecting a sort of theocratic development that they just didn't anticipate anticipate after their initial -- the majority of the folk in the country are much more interested in achieving some kind of democratic union that be does not have a sort of theocratic topdown sort of approach. and the muslim brotherhood seemed to be implementing that along the way in terms of morsi's administration. but again, we have to be really, really skeptical about a military takeover, for instance, what is the timeline? you know, how long before we foe when there are going to be elections and going forward, how do you avoid the same thing from happening again? this is still an islamic country. there still is the capacity for islamic leader shmp pship to ascend in terms of any

democratically elected leader there. it's very complicated. i'm not an expert on the region but i can see ta democracy has its limitations when you think what's going on in the middle east and particularly what's going on right now in egypt. >> i want to go ba can to peter alexander, nbc's white house correspondent. peter, do you get the sense that sort of the careful deliberate response by the white house, is in part because they were in an awkward situation. a democratically elected government and the white house expressed support for the government. now that you have the will of the people expressed through the military, is it surprising there hasn't been a response given all of those complications? your. >> characterization is pretty good. the white house described by some ob ser vers has been moving gingerly on the topic for quite awhile. we haven't heard from the president. i think we said chuck hagel was here. obviously, he's the secretary of defense for the president.

is having his meetings with top advisors we believe. we know they're arriving even as we speak, some of those individuals right now. we are hearing from national security staff at that time that they continue to monitor the situation. obviously, they have over the course of this day and are coordinating as it was described to me the u.s. policy on thetonic. what's so remarkable is the similarities between what's taking place right now. it's almost like a deja vu from just two and a half years ago when at that same time, this administration said to then president hosni mubarak, they were urging him to use restraint and also asking them for the reinforcing the need for these peaceful protests to take place. it's very much the same language we had been hearing from this white house from the conversation that this president had with president morsi just a couple of days ago. we assume we will hear something from the white house at some point this evening. what form that takes we aren't sure. >> you also had at that time the chant, the army and the people

are one. you're seeing the same thing play out. i want to go back to mark ginsberg. we are hearing from some people. in one case, ironically, bashar al assad, some would say the dictator of syria issuing a statement today calling earlier calling on morsi to step down to accept the will of the people. comment for us, if you will on that irony. >> irony? i'd call that comical. here's a dictator who has 100,000 syrian deaths on his hands giving lectures to democratically elected officials what to do? if there ever was anyone who deserved to be thrown out of office, it's been assad for several years. the packet is, at the same time, here is a shiite leader in syria who has no particular love affair with a sunni muslim brotherhood leader in egypt hop by the way, opposed president assad remaining in office.

so in effect, the irony, joy, that you just laid out here is pathetic. that it is morsi who called for assad to leave months ago being ousted and assad is still in power. >> i want to go to joel rubin on that. we now have seen tunanesia, libya, egypt twice. shouldn't bashar al assad get the message perhaps the arab spring has bled into an arab summer that could lap into his country, as well? >> the situation in his country is deplorable as mark points out. it's horrific to watch. what we will see clearly as well as a contrast a stark one at that where the egyptian people are cheering the egyptian army for doing what they believe is in their best interests supposed to in syria where the army is massacring its people. it's testament to a lot of different factors. just reading tea leaves here but

seeing secretary of defense hagel going into the white house or hearing of that, his communications with the military have been robust. certainly that's a long relationship that the u.s. has had with the egyptian military and it's likely paying dividends in terms of understanding what's happening on the ground. the syrian situation where assad believes that he would have some moral high ground to call out other leaders in the region though is despicable. it's also important to remember this is a very complex situation where even mohamed morsi had cut off relations with bashar al assad not so long ago. so there are many moving parts in this situation. >> i want to thank everyone who's joined us today. michael o'hanlon, jewel rubin, james peterson, peter alexander, ayman mohyeldin. we're going to continue to watch the scene unfold in egypt and listen in on the george zimmerman trial when we come zimmerman trial when we come back.♪

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from cairo's tahrir square where the egyptian president mohamed morsi has been ousted by the military and interim government put in its place. we'll continue to monitor developments out of egypt. but first for a moment we'll turn to the george zimmerman trial. today being the last day of witness testimony before the trial takes a break for the july 4 holiday. the prosecution said it could wrap up its case as early as today although the judge has been skeptical of the defense's more time to restart the trial on friday. anthony gorgone has been tiffing about the forensic evidence in the trial. let's listen in. >> b and c are on the back. all right this that's my confusion. is this what's known as the gray sweatshirt? >> this is the hooded. >> now i'm really disoriented here. what stains are on the front and

who are they from? >> a, partial profile matched trayvon martin b and c are on the back. >> and whose are b and c, if you know? >> b tested negative for the possible presence of blood. performed no dna testing on that. c positive for the possible presencence of blood. no dna results were obtained from that. >> so. -- on the front? >> correct. >> and were there any other stains where there might have been a partial profile that you couldn't include or exclude trayvon martin or george zimmerman? >> no, the only stains i got tested for dna were a and c. c i got no dna results. i did swab the as he i explained earlier the sleeves and cuffs of this item, as well.

>> i know what your process was. you just swabbed it from the elbow down to the cuff, not having seen any blood, correct? >> correct. i first used the filter paper to rub it and test that for the possible presence ef of blood. that was negative on both sleeves. so i performed swabbing, dna testing and there was no dna foreign to trayvon martin on either of those. >> if it's not blood and you're pretty sure it's not blood, are you looking for skin cells or other source of dna perhaps the. >> yes any foreign dna that might be on these sleeves which could be touched or skin cells, it could potentially be saliva. anything foreign to trayvon martin i was looking for intentionally. >> frankly, then you just didn't find much of anything on this gray hooded sweatshirt? >> just that partial profile. on the stain a. >> that was the shirt that stunk

to high heaven? >> it didn't smell good, no. >> let's go to the next item if you could. give us a moment to switch out. >> and we are watching the trial of george zimmerman. testimony from the crime lab analyst who looked at the shirt that trayvon martin was wearing on the night he was shot to death by george zimmerman. george zimmerman pleading self-defense. lisa bloom, what is the significance of the testimony we're hearing today about dna on or not on the fingernails of trayvon martin as well as on the sweatshirt? >> what's happening right now is the defense is going after this dna expert, not so much for the work he did, but for the collection work that was done by a person before him. and they've gotten him to say that the hoodie that trayvon martin was wearing that night which he examined had a very

foul odor when he opened the bag ta unfortunately it was placed in a plastic bag instead of a paper bag. that means the biological evidence risked degradation. that was his term. the analogy was given if any of us has a gym bag with wet clothes and we leave it in the car too long and open it a week later and there's that very strong smell, that's the smell that came from the sweatshirt. let me back up to explain what happened on the direct examination of this expert. so the direct examination of this expert went through dna testing and how it all works. and then the esessence of it was there was no trayvon martin dna on the gun although some of the samples were too small to measure. there was no george zimmerman dna on trayvon martin's fingernail scrapings. with regard to martin's hoodie, there was no zimmerman dna on the cuffs that have hoodie. that's something i think the prosecution will make much of it, that george zimmerman was on one stain on trayvon martin's

hoodie. that on george zimmerman's jacket, trayvon martin had some possible dna on two spots on that jacket. so overall, there was a lot of testing that was done that was inconclusive but will were some matches along the lines that i just indicated. >> and what does that indicate? if there was no dna under -- no george zimmerman dna under the finger nails of trayvon martin, what cos that indicate and how does it help the defense or the prosecution? >> as you know, george zimmerman claims there was a fight and he was down and trayvon martin was striking his face. we know george zimmerman's face was bloody. so the prosecution says if indeed trayvon martin was putting his hands over george zimmerman's nose and mouth in an attempt to suffocate him after zimmerman had already been punched, why is this no george zimmerman blood on par tin's hands? why is there no george zimmerman blood under his fingers nails? why is there no zimmerman blood

on martin's cuffs on the sleeves? that's the point they make. on the defense side, they're going after the collection processes that too much was left out in the rain, that the biological evidence degraded and therefore, is not a proper sample. so that's really the two sides how they play out on the dna expert, joy. >> one other thing before we go on to some other things, but there was also testimony earlier today about the sweatshirt and about potential powder burns on the shirt and wa that said about whether or not the gun was actually touching trayvon martin when it was shot or whether there was some distance. tell us the signatures of that evidence. >> uh-huh. >> that's right. so the firearms expert was able to testify that the gun was touching the sweatshirt at the time that george zimmerman pulled the trigger and shot the bullet that killed trayvon martin. it was touching the sweatshirt. everybody seems to agree on that. the question is the whether the sweatshirt was touching trayvon martin's body or not. that's going to remain for the

testimony of the medical examiner who did the autopsy. we have not heard that person yet. the defense claims that the gun did not touch the body. flesh of trayvon martin. why does that matter? because if the sweatshirt was separated from his body, the defense will say that supports their view that trayvon martin was in a diagonal position over george zimmerman. the shirt was separated from the body. it didn't touch the body. if trayvon martin was erect, sitting upright orened staing upright, we would expect his shirt to be relatively close to or up against his body. >> karen, i want to bring you in. you have been a criminal defense attorney. why do you think that the defense is spending so much time going over in an attempt to refute this evidence? because it doesn't seem helpful, i guess, to their case to litigate something that seems relatively clear, that the dn app testing found no george zimmerman dna under the fingernails of trayvon martin

and in this case, they're looking at the shirt, the shirt with the hole in it with the blood on it. what is the probative value for the defense if it doesn't seem they're able to shake the testimony of this witness? >> what they're trying to do is rebut the prosecution saying that you know, this was not a real big deal. this was you know, not the struggle that it's being depicted as. obviously, the defense is using an the self-defense argument. so this is a big deal. so the dna evidence is proving how much contact was there. so if there was a lot of contact, there should be dna under the nails, a lot of dna on both the bodies. and now they're trying to refute the fact that whether there was dna or not, that doesn't necessarily mean that this was not a brutal attack, this was not a brutal struggle. >> all right. we're going to have more on the george zimmerman trial. we're also going to having more on president morsi overthrown in egypt when we come back. why let constipation weigh you down?

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good evening. you're looking at live pictures from cairo's tahrir square. the in egypt making a dramatic change today. mohamed morsi the president of egypt deposed by the egyptian army. we'll continue to watch developments on that sorry. first, let's go back to the trial of george zimmerman, the second degree murder trial taking place in sanford, pl. we're listening to a prosecution expert being questioned by the defense and he is a forensics expert. let's go back analyst. >> and looking at the back here, there's no cuttings and markings. okay. nothing here that. >> no cuttings that i took from the back. >> great. okay.